Summer’s end brings rain to Illawarra

Four web-footed travellers enjoy the rain and fog in Walker Street, Helensburgh on Friday morning.

Summer came to a wet, foggy close on Friday, with rain marking the end of a mild but mostly dry season for the Illawarra.

In contrast to the previous summer when tornadoes lashed Kiama and temperatures over 45 degrees smashed records, the region has had fairly consistent weather patterns this year.

Average top temperatures for December, January and February sat around the mid to late 20s, with January recording the warmest average temperature – 26.2 degrees in Albion Park and 24 at Bellambi Point.

This was more than 1.5 degrees below the warmest average temperature from the previous January, when Albion Park’s average top reading was 27.6 and Bellambi Point was 25.7.

December 20 was the hottest day in the region this summer, with the Albion Park weather station recording 34.2 – well below the sweltering 45.8 recorded on January 18, 2013.

Four web-footed travellers enjoy the rain and fog in Walker Street, Helensburgh.

In Bellambi, temperatures peaked on January 2 this summer, when the mercury reached 33.5degrees.

Boxing Day was the region’s wettest summer day with 71.6 millimetres of rain pouring down at Bellambi during the post-Christmas holiday.

Again, the reading was well down on last year’s maximum, when 177 millimetres of rain was dumped along the coastline.

Showers and temperatures in the low 20s are forecast to stick around through to the end of next week. However tomorrow’s Clean Up Australia Day events will go ahead rain, hail or shine.